


The Long Journey Here

by paranormalbouquet



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Angst, Baby Fic, F/M, Flashbacks, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Mulder POV, Post MSIV, Post S11, Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-24
Updated: 2018-04-24
Packaged: 2019-04-27 02:28:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,765
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14415675
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/paranormalbouquet/pseuds/paranormalbouquet
Summary: Post s11: Mulder lays in bed as his mind takes him on a ride through memories of the past. He finds Scully downstairs with their daughter and a big event ensues.





	The Long Journey Here

**Author's Note:**

> Shoutout to [agoodwoman](https://archiveofourown.org/users/agoodwoman/pseuds/agoodwoman) and her incredible beta for the amazing edits and very thoughtful contributions and feedback to the story. It wouldn’t be what it is without their knowledge and input.

Mulder woke up on a crisp Saturday morning to the sound of silence in a normally noisy house. The days rarely began when he wasn’t stirred out of sleep by the cry of his daughter in the next room over. Over the last ten months, he had grown accustomed to shuffling through his exhaustion as he moved to comfort his child back to sleep, a concept she had yet to fully grasp. On the off chance Mulder awoke before his wife or daughter, he would have Scully’s head on his chest as his heartbeat kept her in a state of slumber. Other mornings, his eyes would slip open to a new day and he’d have his arms wrapped around her frame with the scent of her lavender shampoo filling his olfactory senses. Somehow, he ended up in a life that had become almost perfect to him. He had a ring on his finger and a worn-in spot next to him on a bed, both of which were from a woman he’d loved for nearly half his life.

He and Scully had a baby while both in their fifties. They worried about how their bodies would cooperate with raising a child so late in life. Mulder spent many nights holding a sleepless Scully who would keep herself awake worrying about how her fifty-four-year-old body was going to house a healthy child. Their scarred minds harbored up one too many concerns about the almost impossible situation. The sun had been blanketed by clouds for weeks, but the day they brought their baby girl home, the house was a little brighter. Mulder gazed at Scully holding their newborn and smiled. She had their very own sunshine right in her arms and that little girl would end up bringing more light into their lives than they could’ve ever imagined.

Subconsciously, his arm drifted over to Scully’s side of the bed wanting to pull her in for an embrace like the hug he gave his two girls that day they brought her home. His arm landed on the sheets as he concluded she wasn’t there. 

Their lives had taken twists and turns neither of them would ever wish upon anyone to have gotten to where they stood now. As he laid there in bed that Saturday morning, his mind wandered to endless memories.

He was told over two decades ago that her ova had been taken from her during an abduction executed by men from their own government. He had kept this fact from her in an attempt to try to protect her. He held his fragile partner in a dim hospital hallway and told her that the truth would save her, that it would save both of them.

He had helped her through the loss of her daughter, a child she had never even known existed. During the funeral, he walked up behind her, brushed a hand over her arm and placed a bouquet of flowers on the small casket. He reminded her in that church that she got the chance to know and love this little girl and that Scully was meant to come into her life to save her.

Two years later, she expressed to him that she wished she could have a family of her own. The desperation and sadness in her voice had almost been too much to handle as they laid tangled up in each others bodies in his apartment. He had made love to her that night hoping that either her God was listening as she poured her heart out to him or that sheer will would give her what she longed for so badly.

In Vitro Fertilization was a new path of their journey they tried to walk down. He told her about her eggs and how he found them all those years ago and she immediately wanted to try. The door opened as he was laying on her couch, waiting for her to return from the appointment she hadn’t asked him to come to.

“Scully? I must’ve dozed off. I was waiting for you to get back,” he stated while he noticed the heartbroken look her face displayed. He could tell she was trying to avoid contact with his eyes as she slowly walked up to him. “It didn’t take, did it?”

“I guess it was too much to hope for,” she answered quietly with a small and defeated tone. Her eyes still struggled to choose between his face and the floor.

He hadn’t wanted to let the failure take him over too, but he struggled as he saw her eyes well up with tears. He shook his head and pulled her in for an embrace full of all the comfort he could possibly offer up. 

“It was my last chance,” she cried out into his shoulder.

He told her to never give up on a miracle, a phrase that still rang true to this day. He had made love to her that night just as he had the previous time this topic surfaced. He hoped that God was paying attention and that his attempts at willing a human being into existence would work. 

A miracle had occurred and Scully became pregnant, except he wasn’t there. He had been taken away from her before he even knew he was going to be a father. 

After he returned, he remembered the feeling of being thrown into a life he didn’t quite know how to live anymore. 

He reconnected with Scully through the baby she carried. They feared the possibilities but they both knew the truth.

Threats to Scully’s and their baby’s safety arose as her due date inched closer and closer. He sent her away with Monica to bring the baby into the world safely. He had followed a light in the sky to an abandoned building that had just became the place where his son was brought into the world. 

Seventeen years later and he stood on a pier that had just became the place where his son was taken out of the world. He waited for the impossible to happen. Maybe for his son to have walked out of the building behind him as if he hadn’t just been shot or for him to come popping up out of the water saying he’s fine, he’s alive. 

The impossible did happen.

“What am I now if I’m not a father?” he cried out to her in the empty night. He remembered feeling his heartbeat throughout his entire body.

“You are a father,” she tried to explain to him. As Scully grabbed his hand and placed it on her abdomen, he froze. His heartbeat ceased. No air came in or out of his lungs to refresh him. His blood felt as if it had stopped pumping through his veins which sent a chill through his entire body. Her teary eyes combined with a gentle smile had assured him of her implication and his brain decided it’d stop working too. The gesture on that pier was a surprise he didn’t know how to process for weeks on end. He knew Scully had a tough time with it too but it soon became the spark they both needed in their lives. He was going to be the father he never got the chance to be.

In the quiet of their room, he heard some birds tweeting outside the window as they sang their own sweet songs. The warmth of the sheets on top of him kept him comfortable as he was still lying in their bed, detached from the world and lost in memories. 

Mulder recalled being spooned behind her one night in bed when she was still pregnant as he drew shapes on her enlarged belly. That night while he was fighting the sleepiness that threatened to take him over, he felt a flutter beneath his hand. Though it wasn’t the first time he had felt the baby move under the taught skin encasing their child, it was always enough to pull him back to the world. He was comforted by every movement of their baby, a reminder of the beautiful union that took place between two soulmates. He kissed her on the back of her head as she put her hand over his on her belly. No words were spoken. None needed to be. 

The sun outside seemed to be wrapped in clouds suddenly and the sheets lying on top of him grew cold without the sun beating down on them. The chirping of the birds stopped as they sought a warmer place to continue their harmonious songs. The reminiscing continued itself but in a different light as his drowsy mind sat powerless to the grip the recollections held. 

Scully had minor complications throughout her pregnancy from morning sickness to water retention, but her doctor had assured them both she was doing well for a woman of her age to be carrying a child to term. Thirty-eight weeks, however, had hit them like a brick wall.

He had noticed how sore she looked as they got up. She walked around early that morning with a hand on her lower back. She showered slowly and dressed into a black form-fitting sweater and light gray leggings. It took her longer than it had the day previously but she refused any help. Even in pain, she was stubborn. Scully wasn’t one to complain over the last eight months. She rarely mentioned her discomfort unless her back was really giving her problems and Mulder tried to be there for her with a massage or heating pad to alleviate her ailments.

He sat at the table and ate his breakfast as she sat in the chair across from him taking hesitant sips from her glass of orange juice.

“Scully, you’re not acting like yourself,” he noted as he reached over to hold her hand. Her cereal had been untouched since she poured her bowl ten minutes ago. “Tell me what’s wrong.” 

Her face screwed up in pain and she pulled her hand from his to clutch her lower abdomen. She turned in her chair and dry heaved as she pushed herself to stand up. Scully slowly made her way over to the kitchen sink and vomited the orange juice she drank just moments ago. Immediately, he ran to her to help her keep her balance.

“Mulder-” she stammered, her breath catching at the end of his name. 

The syllables came out scared and choked up. He immediately knew what was wrong as he saw a spot of red grow on the light fabric of her inner leg.

He told her to hold on to the counter and he dashed for his phone. He called 911 without thinking twice.

To this day, he couldn’t vow to what he said to the emergency operator. He helped her back to the table with a tea towel and a plastic bowl they used for popcorn on movie nights. Her breathing sped up as she held the bowl and tried not to lose the rest of her stomach contents. He placed the towel on her forehead as he attempted to bring the both of their inspirations and expirations to a steady rate.

An ambulance arrived as Mulder was helping her put on her jacket. It was all a blur from there to when they got to the hospital. A team of doctors and nurses took her in for an emergency cesarean while another nurse asked him to sign a medical form for the procedure. He cursed the time it took to get scrubbed up because it meant he had to be away from her. 

When he walked in, she had already been drugged and was laying on the operating table with the sheet up that separated her head and chest from her torso. He imagined her mind running through all the things that could go wrong and her closed eyes and long breaths through a barely opened mouth confirmed his suspicions. 

He sat in the chair with the fabric divider an inch away from his face. Delicately, Mulder held her hand with an IV drip and the tape bumping his palm as he made promises of the ways in which he would be a father to their miracle child. He whispered sweetly to Scully how he was going to get up with her in the middle of the night to warm a bottle or change a diaper. He would teach her about space, the planets and the stars. He would show her the beauty of math in baseball and no matter what, he would be by both their sides regardless of what the world threw at them this time around.

He nuzzled his face into her and kissed her shoulder while he waited for the light of his life to make her grand entrance.

A cry burst through the operating room. A sweet baby girl called for air in a room full of doctors and nurses who were cooing at her arrival. 

Happy tears fell down his cheeks as he looked upon the sight of their healthy girl.

“She’s okay, Scully,” he announced quietly to her. “Oh my god, she’s absolutely gorgeous.”

Thus began the greatest journey with better rewards and more difficult challenges than he had faced the entire time in the basement office with Scully. He got to be the father he never had. He wouldn’t trade it for the world.

His body was warmed as the sheets baked in the shining sun that decided to come out again. He took a deep breath in and out and stepped out of bed. 

He padded down the steps quietly and scanned the living room that had sun spilling in through the open windows. His eyes finally caught on Scully as she gently bounced their ten-month-old daughter on her hip. She softly sang to her:

_“Abigail was a bullfrog._

Was a good friend of mine...”

He stood there in awe of this life he was living. 

They’d finished running from invisible forces, done from being threatened by everything under the sun. 

It was now just Fox Mulder, Dana Scully, and their daughter Abigail Mulder.

Scully’s hair had grown to it’s long length again. He watched it sway against her back and observed their daughter as she grabbed a handful of the beautiful locks. A smile couldn’t help but creep to his face. 

He snuck up behind the two of them and captured them in a hug. His head landed in between Abby’s and Scully’s. Scully let out a laugh with a giant smile on her face.

“Oh! Daddy surprised us, didn’t he?” she commented to their daughter. 

Abby put a grin on her face and let out a giggle. She had blue eyes and auburn hair, a little button nose and puffy pink cheeks. To Mulder, she was perfect.

“What are my girls doing up so early on this fine Saturday?” he asked as he planted kisses on their cheeks. 

He felt Abby’s tiny hand on his back as he hugged them. He turned his head and kissed the chubby baby arm that patted her own little rhythms.

“We were just a little rowdy this morning, weren’t we?” Scully answered as she turned in Mulder’s arms. 

Abby flailed her arms a little as her father’s face came into her sight. She held both arms out for him. Mulder lifted his arms off Scully in response to his daughter’s gesture. 

“Dada, dada!” Abby exclaimed as she kept her arms extended out toward him.

He froze, unprepared with what to do next in this situation. His eyes just widened and Scully’s jaw dropped. It wasn’t just a first for Abby but one for him as well. He’d been Fox, a son, a brother. He had been called spooky or that crazy-guy-whose-sister-got-abducted-by-aliens. He was Mulder, a partner, a lover, a husband. He’d been able to call himself a father before, as painful as it was, but he’d never had the joy of being called Dad by his own child.

He felt Scully’s eyes on him as his mouth formed into one of the biggest smiles he’d ever had. He satisfied Abby’s wiggling arms and held her close. He got choked up as he looked at his gleeful daughter and then at Scully who stood there with a teary grin. 

Mulder had the reaffirmation of what he had felt when they lost William over a year and a half ago on that pier to the Smoking Man. He was a father and every ounce of his body would do better than the lineage he came from.


End file.
